The present invention relates to an examination table which can be varied in height and angle for use in the performing of various medical examinations, especially radiological examinations such as stratigraphy, mammography, tomography, or endoscopic examinations, where wide-ranging patient position changes are needed in order to carry out all of the examinations correctly.
Prior art examination tables relating to the above field are equipped with blocking elements to constrain the supine patient to the table, and are inferiorly solid to a slide element having a horizontal-axis part-cylindrical shape, with the arched portion inferiorly arranged. This slide element is inferiorly supported and can perform oscillations about its own axis on command of special movement means which bring the patient into all the positions necessary for the examinations, starting from a vertical position with head up to a slightly inclined position with respect to a horizontal plane, with the patient's head slightly below his feet. Owing to well-known geometrical problems, a so-conformed slide element together with its support elements cannot bring the patient into a position where his head is considerably below the level of his feet, nor, obviously, where the patient is in a vertical head-down position. Numerous examinations would be more efficiently carried out if the above-described positions were possible.
Further, height regulation of the known examination tables is not possible, which once again leads to drawbacks where numerous types of medical tests are concerned.